An Air Niugini Boeing 737-800, registration P2-PXE performing flight PX-73 from Pohnpei to Chuuk (Micronesia) with 35 passengers and 12 crew, was on final approach to Chuuk's runway 04 in poor weather when the aircraft came too low and touched down into the sea and came to a stop about 150 meters left abeam of runway threshold. The aircraft was evacuated, all passengers and crew were able to leave the aircraft. A few serious injuries (bone fractures) are being reported, however, no critical injuries.

The airline confirmed the aircraft landed short of the runway in Chuuk at 10:10L (00:10Z) in heavy rain and reduced visibility. All 35 passengers and 12 crew were able to safely evacuate the aircraft.

The airport reported the aircraft was cleared to land but touched down short of the runway.

Passengers reported the aircraft was on final approach to Chuuk when they thought they had a hard touch down until they realized they had landed in the sea. The aircraft floated long enough for everybody to leave the aircraft and be rescued by locals in their boats.

According to Micronesia's Civil Aviation Department Chuuk features a NDB/DME approach to runway 04 and RNAV (GPS) approaches to both runways (the related charts however are offline as of current). No precision approaches are available. Runway 04/22 is 6006 feet/1831 meters long with a grooved asphalt surface. Both runways feature PAPI lights at 3 degrees glidepath to their left.

An Air Niugini Boeing 737-800, registration P2-PXE performing flight PX-73 from Pohnpei to Chuuk (Micronesia) with 35 passengers and 12 crew, was on final approach to Chuuk's runway 04 in poor weather when the aircraft came too low and touched down into the sea and came to a stop about 150 meters left abeam of runway threshold. The aircraft was evacuated, all passengers and crew were able to leave the aircraft. A few serious injuries (bone fractures) are being reported, however, no critical injuries.

The airline confirmed the aircraft landed short of the runway in Chuuk at 10:10L (00:10Z) in heavy rain and reduced visibility. All 35 passengers and 12 crew were able to safely evacuate the aircraft.

The airport reported the aircraft was cleared to land but touched down short of the runway.

Passengers reported the aircraft was on final approach to Chuuk when they thought they had a hard touch down until they realized they had landed in the sea. The aircraft floated long enough for everybody to leave the aircraft and be rescued by locals in their boats.

According to Micronesia's Civil Aviation Department Chuuk features a NDB/DME approach to runway 04 and RNAV (GPS) approaches to both runways (the related charts however are offline as of current). No precision approaches are available. Runway 04/22 is 6006 feet/1831 meters long with a grooved asphalt surface. Both runways feature PAPI lights at 3 degrees glidepath to their left.

The procedure of an 'immediate' accounting for 'all' passengers apparently failed as did some sort of underwater drone video search.

However, the procedure of double checking for 'all' passengers did not_fail as did an additional search of the plane.

Still the question if the passenger simply did drownded or was there physical injury or incapacitation may have caused the drownding (or if they did died from some other cause) is not_addressed yet in the article.

Based on recent experiences, we will be waiting for the final report on that.

I've seen news reports from before the body was found that included witnesses saying that the man did board one of the boats.
Assuming that he was not pulled in already dead or severely injured (there was nothing on that on the witnesses account), that tends to discard the severe physical injury version.

At the same time, if he was already on a boat with many other persons, it would be strange that he would fall off the boat and nobody notice it.

Finally, he was found by divers, apparently not_inside the plane, so he came out somehow.

Conclusion: I don't know. It seems to me that the information is not all consistent, which makes it harder for speculation.